One educator, determined to create an engaging and dynamic experience for learners of all ages.

Teachers in our district have the option of attending a district Institute Day (PD Day) over the summer or during the school year. I was asked to lead a session with my fellow Technology Facilitator and our middle school Instructional Coach. We wanted to spice things up and provide an authentic learning environment for our teachers, so we decided to implement an Edcamp style PD. We utilized the first half of the day for our Edcamp and during the second half of the day, teachers worked with in their PLCs to put their new knowledge into action and develop plans and assessments for the year. We had about 70 middle school teachers participate in our day of learning and all content areas were included.

If you don’t know about the Edcamp craze, check it out here. We started the day with a bit of a keynote that the three of us prepared, which reviewed TPACK and SAMR. After a brief discussion, we prompted our staff to participate in a Quickfire Challenge to demonstrate their understanding of the framework and model. Quickfire Challenges are a concept which can be attributed to Dr. Leigh Graves Wolf of Michigan State University (see her post here about them). Having been a student in the Master of Arts in Educational Technology program at MSU, I have lived through so many Quickfires and love how they sparked my interest and brought energy to learning (I even used them with students when I was a classroom teacher!). Below you’ll see the guidelines for our Quickfire and if you click on the image, it will take you to the Thinglink with live links.

Teachers then had to share their creation on a Schoology discussion board. Note that they were only given 10 minutes to complete this task. Here are three examples of what they created and shared. When you take a step back to think about it, it’s actually pretty cool. We gave them NO instruction on how to do any of this, from the technology they picked to uploading to a Schoology discussion board. They had to play with it and they were immersed in creation with a looming deadline. Was it stressful? Yes. Was it meaningful? Yes. Did they enjoy it? After it was done :). We had everything from videos to Haikus. They also got to see how allowing for choice with a choice board was simple and meaningful to the learner, because they experienced it as their students would.

After this recap, we then discussed how Edcamps work and how you “vote with your feet”. We then asked the teachers what they wanted to learn that day. Now, we did do some pre-planning when it came to this and planted some seeds because we weren’t sure what teachers would do in the face of being given total choice. We knew we wanted to have at least 6 sessions going at one time. We thought of 3 sessions which we knew teachers would be looking for and created a “Playlist” of resources that they could explore as a part of their breakout discussion for a bit of scaffolding into the open world of Edcamps. We also planted some seeds in terms of talking to a few teachers ahead of time and asking them to share their learning interests if the crowd got quiet- luckily we did that because teachers were at a loss initially when posed with the challenge of getting to voice what they wanted to learn. Once a few of our seeds spoke up, it got the ball rolling and we were able to find teacher facilitators for each session. We purposefully did not facilitate any sessions. While breakouts were occurring, we rotated through rooms to offer conversation or answer any questions of difficulty. We made sure to have an “App Playground” during all breakout sessions to assist teachers who simply needed to focus the day on growing their technological knowledge in terms of the functions of the iPads and apps.

When we returned from the breakout sessions, we had a “Show what you know SLAM”, which is a derivative of an App Slam or Demo Slam that you see at Edcamps. We asked teachers to share something that they learned in a breakout session, which prompted lots of “Ooohhs and Ahhhhs” from the audience. Of course, each teacher only had 1 minute to share what they learned, so it was a rapid fire race to talk about their big takeaways.

Overall, we had a lot of great feedback about the day. What would we change? We would notify all staff to come with ideas for conversation topics that they were interested in. I believe that if we do this again, now that all of our teachers will have 1:1 experience under their belts, the conversations will spark more readily and their comfort with guiding their own learning will also increase now that they have exposure to this style of PD.

This year, we are transitioning from a pilot year of 300 student devices to our inaugural year of full implementation with about 900 student devices. With feedback from teachers stating that they were ready to go and wanted to be able to use the device asap with students, we decided to attempt an iPad distribution day before the school year started. So, we started to put plans into place!

Some things you should know about our distribution are that we had summer employees tag, scan, and assign iPads to students. They also had the fun job of removing them from their boxes, labeling the iPad for the student, and placing the iPad in our new cases. We are using Apple’s new Mobile Device Management program this year and parents were asked throughout the summer to create an Educational Apple ID for their student(s) under 13 years old. We pair Apple’s MDM with Cisco’s Meraki MDM. Now that we have all of the technical specs out of the way, let’s take a look at the actual event details.

We scheduled one day, a week before school started, from 1pm-7pm for students to pick up their devices. Students had to have their iPad Handbook signed and hopefully had created an Apple ID before coming to the event. We decided to not split them into certain time frames by alphabetical order or ask them to schedule a time for pick up since we were doing distribution for just one day. We had 26 teachers in our building volunteer to help (our teachers rock!), in addition to about six student Tech Squad members. The helpers were arranged in shifts from 1pm-4pm and 4pm-7pm for the most part. Let me tell you, I can’t imagine doing this with any less number of helpers!

We set up the event in stations so that the tasks were separated. At each of the six stations we had a poster with the steps of the station so that individuals could start the station steps on their own while they waited in line. We also had handouts on each table with the same steps. We tried to have at least 2 helpers at each station. For some of the more challenging stations, we had three helpers.

Station 1: We initially separated individuals as they entered into two lines: 1. Have an Edu Apple ID, 2. Don’t have an Edu Apple ID yet. Then, when they had taken care of business at Station 1 with either just signing in or creating an Apple ID, they received a ticket so that they could proceed to Station 2 and pick up their iPad.

Station 2: The red ticket was used so that Station 2 knew that the student had checked in and had turned in their signed iPad Handbook. This worked really well. Students told the helper their last name and as the helper searched for the iPad, the student found their name on a sheet of labels. Students then immediately labeled their chargers. After getting their iPad, they proceeded to Station 3.

Station 3: Students went through the startup configuration of the iPad, until they got to the “Get Started” message and home screen.

Station 4: Students renamed their iPads so that we could manage them by building and grade level. They also turned on items in the app store so that they could receive apps.

Station 5: Students set up their student email and found their Meraki email so that their device could receive apps.

Station 6: Students checked to make sure they had the Meraki profile on their device and then completed an expectation checklist so that they were aware of the big iPad rules before leaving the building.

Issues

Successes

Lessons Learned

Network flooded when trying to create Apple IDs and wouldn’t allow us to access site for ID creation. It seemed to be a two-part issue (our side & Apple’s side) because parents couldn’t access the site from their phones which were not on our WiFi.

“Missing iPads”- Since devices were labeled, etc. at another building, we were actually missing a few boxes that we were not aware of until the event started. We also did not plan on new students (like registered a few days prior) arriving to pick up devices. So, we had some students who came and their devices weren’t even in our boxes of missing iPads that arrived.

Dead iPads

Stations and the number of helpers running each station.

Clear directions posted large and having handouts on table.

We pulled people when the line got too long and we created stations in the lobby near our gym so that they did not have to wait in line forever. This kept people happy.

Multiple WiFi access points.

Having power strips on hand.

Having printed copies of student usernames and passwords on hand at the first station and email station.

Possibly label the iPads then and there, which will cut down on time it took to try to locate the iPad and would also solve issues of devices not being able to be located.

You can never have enough WiFi access points!

Having parents come in over the summer to create their Apple IDs if they need assistance.

Overall, we had more success than issues and after the first two hours of a non-stop line of people, we were easily able to get people in and out in under 20 minutes. The biggest hang up which caused for some people to be there longer was due to our issues accessing Apple’s website through parent email. When parents were clicking the “Consent” button, the webpage was redirecting them to the wrong page and was not allowing them to create an actual Educational Apple ID for their student. We ended up just forming a line where we took the parent’s information so that we could help them create an Apple ID at a later time. Being flexible and creating a plan on the go really helped! We had about 700/853 students come through to pick up their devices that evening and it was truly an awesome showing of our learning community with the number of staff, students, and parents involved!

Remix, Repurpose, and Redesign: Promoting Student Ownership and Engagement: My colleagues and I presented on strategies for remixing content and repurposing technologies, which allows educators to redesign their pedagogical strategies. Through low-tech and high-tech repurposing, students can engage in deep play, allowing them to get lost in the content…in a good way! These strategies include redesigns of every day classroom routines, like Bell Ringers, classroom rules, Exit Slips, etc. Click the image below to be taken to session resources.

iPadeology: Staff and Student Resources for iPad Deployment: My colleague and I presented on the key characteristics of the mindset that we developed to guide decision making during our first year in our district’s 1:1 pilot. We share the steps we believe made us successful, how we managed to keep the focus on instruction and not the device, student development resources, staff development resources, and parental resources for deployment. Click the image below to be taken to session resources.

If you’ve never been to a Maker Faire or Mini Maker Faire, I recommend jumping in and finding one near you to attend. I’ve had the opportunity to attend 2 Maker Faires in Detroit and just attended my second Mini Maker Faire- the Chicago Southside Mini Maker Faire. While attending a Maker or Mini Maker Faire, you will be exposed to creativity, genius, and connected learning galore! As educators, there is also a lot to learn from the Maker mindset. Check out this post from Makezine.com on how they believe it can transform education. Hand in hand, the Maker culture also serves as a great connection to STEM and STEAM…and there are a plethora of resources you can scoop up for your classroom by attending one! Click the Maker Faire poster on your left to see my favorite highlights from the Chicago Southside Mini Maker Faire.

All geared up with our new League of EdTechies badges, combining our creative super powers, we were able to develop a dynamic and fun professional development that engaged our peers and allowed for teacher leadership. A colleague of mine mentioned the idea of “Speed Geeking” last year and we finally had a chance to employ it when February came upon us and love was in the air! Let’s first share the results of how this opportunity lead to igniting some sparks…

The best thing happened directly after this PD. I was in a breakout session room cleaning up and a teacher who is more cautious with exploring new technologies came up to me and said, “I’m going to go home and play now!”Best. Thing. Ever. Continuing that, I received about ten emails from non 1:1 staff that evening sharing ideas and excitement. When I walked into school the next morning, there was a huddle of five teachers discussing the PD and their ideas from it near the office. Exploration and collaboration were occurring! There was energy! I then collaborated with a teacher on how she could do this with her students and we brought Speed Geeking into the classroom to explore note taking strategies when researching.

Below is the main presentation we utilized for our professional development and an overview of how it all came to be. We had some goals which of course drove the decisions we made:

1. Continue our discussion of TPACK and apply it to a lesson design that was coming up in the next trimester

2. Model meaningful technology integration

3. Allow for play and creation

4. Make it applicable!

We are fortunate enough to have support from our awesome administration, so we were able to use 1.5 hours of our 2 hour monthly staff meeting. Here’s the breakdown of how The League of EdTechies provided this professional development for our 75+ member staff:

Preparation:

The League of EdTechies voted on some of the core apps that they felt would be important to all staff moving forward with our 1:1. We selected apps that had a range of complexity so that everyone would have an option to learn something at their level. We selected 6 apps and paired 2 League members per app. They created samples of how each app could be used in the classroom. Naturally, they created artifacts geared towards instruction and assessment- they did a phenomenal job! We emailed all staff members about a week before the staff meeting and reminded them to download Notability if they had not done so previously. This was a HUGE key to the flow of our PD because we could jump right into application and did not have to go through the hoops of downloading during the PD. We also had them bring a learning target that they would be focusing on next semester so that we could keep a strong focus on context and application during our PD.

Delivery:

We started by getting everyone into our Schoology staff course where we house all of our staff meeting notes and taught them how to download a PDF and import it into Notability. This ties in with our idea of embedded PD- we didn’t give them much direction on how to use it other than about a 2 minute tutorial of the basics they needed to know to work with the document for this experience.

We then went right into Speed Geeking by giving a short, one minute intro into what they needed to do as participants.

The League Members were split up in somewhat of buffet style tables, we had 2 tables per app and split The League presenters up so that we could keep our groups small. We gave them 2 minutes to present their app to each small group.

To keep the energy high, we played music when the two minutes were up. Of course we had to include classic mood-setters in our playlist like some of Marvin Gaye’s greatest hits!

We had the presenters rotate and kept the rest of the teachers seated for ease of transition.

When the rotations were complete, we regrouped and began our discussion of TPACK and repurposing technologies for educational purposes.

Teachers had to then apply their knowledge to the learning target that they brought with them.

After applying their knowledge of TPACK, we had them select a breakout session to further explore the technology that peaked their curiosity during Speed Geeking. (We used Socrative to embed formative assessment technologies into the PD also)

The goal of the breakout session was to create an artifact that the teachers could use in the next semester (keep in mind, the majority of teachers only had 1 iPad in their classroom this year). We limited the amount of tutorial we gave teachers in the breakout sessions, pointed them to resources to help support their technical understanding, and encouraged them to explore and play with the technology. Very similar to the feel of a PLAYDATE.

At the end of the PD, teachers completed an exit slip in Schoology and were awarded a digital badge signifying their reflection and participation in exploration of one of the certain apps.

Here’s a “SAMR Brainstorming Guide” that I created for the teachers in our district to provide more guidance on how to swim in the different levels of The SAMR Model. This guide was provided in conjunction with professional development. For more information on The SAMR Model, visit http://www.hippasus.com/rrpweblog/.

Here’s a “TPACK Planning Guide” that I created for the teachers in our district to provide more guidance in planning effective technology integration utilizing the TPACK framework. For more information on TPACK, visit tpack.org.